Al-Akhbar is currently going through a transitional phase whereby the English website is available for Archival purposes only. All new content will be published in Arabic on the main website (www.al-akhbar.com).

Al-Akhbar Management

By Max Blumenthal - Fri, 2011-11-18 14:26-

Yesterday, the New York Police Department deployed a strange new weapon against the tens of thousands of demonstrators who converged downtown for the largest protest in Occupy Wall Street's two month history: the LRAD sound cannon. NYPD officers reportedly blasted Occupy protesters with rays from the LRAD cannon while they sang the American national anthem near Lower Manhattan's Zuccotti Park (photos here), establishing an atmosphere of fear and intimidation that lasted throughout the evening.

Designed and manufactured by the San Diego-based LRAD Corporation, which was formerly known as the American Technology Corporation, the Long Range Acoustic Device sound weapon is the latest innovation in crowd suppression technology. It is portable and powerful, capable of transmitting a focused ray of 140 decibels of sound at a crowd of people, generating painful cranial vibrations so profound ear plugs become useless. According to LRAD promotional material, the sonic weapon "provides military personnel with a powerful, penetrating warning tone that can be followed by clear voice broadcasts in host nation languages to warn and shape the behavior of potential threats."

In June, LRAD sold $293,000 worth of its 100X and 500X sound canon systems to the Israeli Ministry of Defense. The contract was part of Israeli Army Commander Maj. Gen. Avi Mizrahi's investment in $35 million in suppression systems in anticipation of widespread unrest in the occupied West Bank that was to have been prompted by the Palestinian Authority's statehood bid at the United Nations.

The Israeli Army has refined the use of LRAD systems on the civilian population of Palestinian villages engaged in the unarmed popular struggle against Israel's illegal military occupation. Demonstrators in the village of Beit Ummar have been repeatedly assaulted by Israeli forces armed with LRAD systems, including on October 7, when the Israeli army used the LRAD to attack unarmed demonstrators protesting against the abuse and isolation of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.

I first visited the Beit Ummar area in the spring of 2009, joining a group of international and Israeli activists as they protected the village's farmers from fanatical Jewish settlers from the colony of Bat Ayn, who had repeatedly assaulted them as they attempted to work their fields. As soon as I arrived I witnessed a group of Jewish children from Bat Ayn charge down a hill while chanting, "Death to Arabs!" at the farmers.

In January 2011, settlers shot a Beit Ummar resident, 17-year-old Yousef Fakhri Ikhlayl in the head, leaving him brain dead. The settlers could not carry out their deadly violence without the protection of the Israeli Army, which invariably defends them while crushing unarmed protests in Beit Ummar with disproportionate force.

Beit Ummar has carried on its unarmed popular resistance struggle against impossible odds. The village has been severed in half by a settler bypass road, Highway 60, which occupied Palestinians are forbidden from traveling on. Numerous graves in the village cemetery were desecrated in order to build the Israelis-only highway. Not only are village residents surrounded by army pillboxes and preyed on by extremist settlers, they have been transformed into experimental gerbils in the global pacification industry's laboratory of doom.

Having been tested on a defenseless, occupied population in Palestine, the LRAD made its grand debut in New York City yesterday, where local police forces targeted American citizens peacefully protesting against economic exploitation. The peculiar weapon system symbolizes the creeping Israelification of America's local police forces and the Palestinianization of all who challenge the predations of a zero tolerant 1 percent master class.

As the blogger Ayesha Kazmi recently wrote to Occupy movement participants, "So welcome to the War on Terror. Your first lesson, if your views happen to counter the established narrative, expect to be dehumanised, then treated like a terrorist."

140dB is quite extreme. If the device provides that in reality, that is in the same arena as being hit with a baton or rubber bullets. 120dB is the accepted pain level and instantaneous permanent hearing damage, like sitting next to a jet engine taking off. Since the decibel is a logarithmic system every 3dB roughly corresponds to a doubling in volume, so that is roughly 6 times louder. Not a device to be used against unarmed protesters.

And from the same Lia Tarachansky's report on the not tragic death, not " criminal murder" of Iklay

“[Shimi] Prazot, 32, added, “our group included 12-year-olds, women over the age of 60, and no one had planned for a situation like that. We didn’t even know where to run to … I asked anyone in our group who had a weapon to cover the seniors’ and children’s escape. I cocked my personal weapon and hid behind a boulder”.

"establishing an atmosphere of fear and intimidation that lasted throughout the evening"

Using loud, irritating noises to control a crowd so people can get to & from work is creating an atmosphere of fear & intimidation? Look at how countries are reacting to protests throughout the world, I think sound cannons are much less fearful & intimidating than getting my face shot off or getting detained & physically tortured for hours. Look at Syria, Egypt, Iran, Libya, etc.
"Having been tested on a defenseless, occupied population in Palestine"
Its hard to call a population defenseless when they are guilty of rocket & mortar attacks on settlements, suicide bombings in public squares & on buses, abductions, & the constant threat of violence. Its hard to feel like the 13 million jews surrounded by the hundreds of millions of muslims who make it well known that they want them eliminated are the bullies picking on a defenseless population. If you didn't forget, they had an equal border situation from the 1940's to the 60's until 3 surrounding muslim countries invaded Israel & got their ass kicked in less than a week. Trust me, I'm well aware of the fact that Israel can be an asshole from time to time but to call the Palestinians "defenseless", go talk to the victim of a suicide bombing about how defenseless the poor Palestinians are. Both sides are assholes that hate each other because they both want control over Jerusalem for religious reasons, nothing's going to change & you're biased horseshit isn't helping anything.

Also, anybody who has ever heard a qualified person talk about journalism for more than 15 seconds should be disgusted by this article. The first thing anybody learns in Journalism is that if there is a clear bias in what you're writing its an opinion piece, not journalism. Than again, what a surprise that there's an almost Goebells-like propaganda piece thats clearly anti-Western coming out of a news organization known as Al Akhbar. What's the next headline story, the holocaust was a myth & the jews who created it were behind 9/11 as well? Its amazing how a muslim news organization will call a sound cannon "establishing an atmosphere of fear & intimidation" meanwhile when there are protests in muslim countries they are met with gunfire & tanks. As much as I as an American would love to take advice on how to have a sustainable culture from a group of people who behead apostates & chop off clits I think I'm going to take a raincheck. And thanks for the anti-America horseshit, i'm sure my tax dollars are giving millions in aid to whatever shit country this nonsense is based out of.....you're welcome.

"The Long Range Acoustic Device sound weapon is the latest innovation in crowd suppression technology. It is portable and powerful, capable of transmitting a focused ray of 140 decibels of sound at a crowd of people, generating painful cranial vibrations so profound ear plugs become useless..."

It never occurred to the Israeli media to ask why the youths had thrown stones. Here are some thoughts. It could have been that they mistook the group for settler scouts looking for a place to start a new outpost. Maybe they were frustrated at the military raids in their village two days before. Maybe they were angry that settlers had killed19-year-old Oday Maher Hamza Qadous near Nablus the day before. Or maybe they understood the group to be exactly what it was and wanted them off Palestinian land. In all likelihood they threw stones because throwing stones at any facet of the occupation is a boy’s rite of passage in the occupied territories.

'On 28 January 2011, the David and Ahikam Tours Company took a group of Jewish-Israeli hikers over the lands of the Palestinian village of Beit Ummar in the Hebron governorate. Youths from the village saw the group and threw stones. The hikers shot back, using live ammunition, wounding 23-year-old Bila Mohammad Abed Al-Qador and killing 17-year-old Yousef Fakhri Ikhlayl.'